Evaluating The Knowledge Of Conversational Agents, Mina Park, Milam Aiken, Mahesh Vanjani

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

Several studies have tested chatbots for their abilities to emulate human conversation, but few have evaluated the systems’ general knowledge. In this study, we asked two chatbots (Mitsuku and Tutor) and a digital assistant (Cortana) several questions and compared their answers to 67 humans’ answers. Results showed that while Tutor and Cortana performed poorly, the accuracies of Mitsuku and the humans were not significantly different. As expected, the chatbots and Cortana answered factual questions more accurately than abstract questions.

Social Media And The C-Suite: The Ethical And Legal Implications, Toni P. Mulvaney J.D., Melissa Baldo J.D., Marleen Swerdlow J.D., Frank Cavaliere J.D.

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

The last twenty years has seen phenomenal growth of social media, with companies such as Facebook, Linked In, and Twitter seeing their registered users growing into the hundreds of millions worldwide (and, in the case of Facebook, over a billion). The advantages of using social media have been touted by many, and fortunes have been made by savvy practitioners with a deft hand at using social media to their advantage. However, as with any new technology unintended consequences have begun to unfold. These consequences have been thrust to the forefront as several high-profile corporate executives and celebrities have sabotaged their …

The Flipped Class: Experiential Learning Manifested, Johnnie Williams, Olusegun Felix Ayadi, Carlton Perkins, Ladelle M. Hyman

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

Through the “flipped class,” students are introduced to new material outside the classroom before the traditional in-class lecture occurs. Ideally, flipping the class challenges students to engage in the lower levels cognitive work (remembering and understanding) outside of class. Students, then, are free to focus on higher order cognitive work (application, analysis, synthesis, and/or evaluation) in class, where they have the support of their peers and the instructor. To drive the requisite higher order cognitive work inside the classroom, it is important that in-class teaching and learning methodologies extend beyond simple information dissemination. Experiential learning, the process of transforming information …

College Of Business Dean's Report: 2018-2019, Ryan Butt

College of Business Dean’s Reports

No abstract provided.

Moosejaw Market Expansion Into France, Rachel Renou

Honors Projects

This research project examines the Moosejaw brand, the outdoor apparel industry, and an overview of France’s political, economic, and cultural environment. The research goal is to analyze key aspects of France that would influence a business’s decision to expand into the country. The information regarding France’s fit for new businesses would then be tailored to Moosejaw to implement. Data found throughout the research process that characterize France as a good fit or not for new foreign business include the current political state of rioting by the Yellow Vests, Macron’s future pro-business plans, the French high quality of life standard, shifting …

Battling Counterfeits In A Massive Market: Designing And Evaluating An Id-Tag Based Solution For Electronic Product Monitoring And Controlling, Xiao Ying Chen

Dissertations and Theses Collection (Open Access)

The problem of counterfeit and shoddy goods in China has been rampant and persistent one. The complexity of the Chinese market makes solving this problem extremely difficult. Three government agencies have tried to combat this problem extensively, from market entrance permission for prior-processing, sampling and inspection for in-processing, and punishment for post-processing. The responsibility division among agencies, however, created the cracks and holes in dealing with the problem. The existing government solution is too slow in response and too sparse in coverage to be effective and efficient. Anti-counterfeit labels and their derivatives are employed for counterfeit identification and prevention. Their …

Adaptive Workflow Design Based On Blockchain, Daniel Narh Treku, Jun Sun

Information Systems Faculty Publications

Increasingly, organizational processes have become more complex. There is a need for the design of workflows to focus on how organizations adapt to emergent processes while balancing the need for decentralization and centralization goal. The advancement in new technologies especially blockchain provides organizations with the opportunity to achieve the goal. Using blockchain technology (i.e. smart contract and blocks of specified consensus for deferred action), we leverage the theory of deferred action and a coordination framework to conceptually design a workflow management system that addresses organizational emergence (e-WfMS). Our artifact helps managers to predict and store the impact of deferred actions. …

Virtual International Leadership Within Organizations: Overcoming Cultural, Language, And Physical Barriers, Jaye Goulet

Thinking Matters Symposium Archive

Advances in technology are allowing members of a team to collaborate while being geographically and spatially apart. These new teams, known as virtual teams, have benefits for both the organizations to which they belong and to the individual members. Organizations are able to utilize highly-skilled experts without the associated relocation costs. Team members are able to contribute to projects in their field of expertise without having to leave their homeland. These teams require a leader whose interactions build trust and loyalty without the benefit of face-to-face contact with other team members. Although virtual teams are rapidly growing, research is lacking …

Exploring The Influence Of Pre- And Post-Purchase Services Mix On Millennial Shopping Behavior, Matt Elbeck, Debbie Delong, Hannah Wilburn

Atlantic Marketing Association Proceedings

No abstract provided.

Tech Entrepreneurship: An Experiential Journey, Punit Arora

Open Educational Resources

This course uses Lean Launchpad for creating entrepreneurial ventures that start small but can be scaled up fairly quickly. You should you take this class only IF you are interested in creating such ventures. This course provides real world, hands-on learning on what it’s like to actually start a high-tech company. This class is not about how to write a business plan. It’s not an exercise on how smart you arein a classroom, or how well you use the research library to size markets. This is a practical class – essentially a lab, not a theory or “book” …

Adoption Of Self-Service Technologies Among Banking Customers: A Revisit, Irbha Magotra, Jyoti Sharma, Supran Kumar Sharma

International Journal of Applied Management and Technology

The introduction of self-service technologies (SSTs) in the banking industry has been emerging as one of the significant business drivers that facilitate customers in operating their bank accounts. Considering this, the present study has made an attempt to pierce the existing literature with reference to the adoption of SSTs among banking customers. Particularly, the intent of the present article is to explore various personal (e.g., optimism, socioeconomic characteristics) and technology characteristics (e.g., perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use) that affect the acceptance of SSTs among the banking customers. Based on a review of the literature, a conceptual model for SST …

Story Of Twin Cities, Who Will Be The Next Storm Center Of Art Fairs?, Rui Bian

MA Theses

Since 2000, with the rapid development of China's economy, the evolution of contemporary art fairs in China has been accelerated. This paper takes two representative cities, Beijing and Shanghai, as examples. In the past one decade, Shanghai and Beijing have respectively led the trend of contemporary art market due to various internal and external factors. This paper uses PEST model to analyze, trying to find out who will be the next center of contemporary art in the next ten years.

The first part of this paper mainly starts from the differentiations in policies and regional distributions of Chinese contemporary art …

Soft Skills Needed For The 21st-Century Workforce, Susan A. Dean, Julia I. East

International Journal of Applied Management and Technology

Technical skills are no longer enough for workers to compete in this highly competitive global work environment. Soft skills are of paramount importance. A multiple-case-study design through the lens of emotional intelligence formed the basis of the research study. The focus of the research was identification of the successful soft skills training strategies in the logistics industry. Three logistics organization leaders in the counties of Burlington, Middlesex, and Somerset, New Jersey, were participants in the study. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and the review of company documents Four themes emerged through data analysis of converging multiple data sources: (a) …

Researching Pure Digital Entrepreneurship – A Multimethod Insider Action Research Approach, Kisito Futonge Nzembayie, Anthony Paul Buckley, Thomas M. Cooney

Articles

Knowledge production in Pure Digital Entrepreneurship (PDE) needs to reflect the non-linear nature of a journey defined by digital artifact and platform creation. Accordingly, this paper proposes and offers practical guidance on the use of Multimethod Insider Action Research (MIAR) as a suitable research design for studying the entrepreneurial journey in this context. It argues for integrating first-person Reflective Practice, second-person Collaborative Inquiry and Design Research for third-person knowledge production that balances rigour and relevance. While calls for such forms of longitudinal process inquiry have largely gone unanswered due to identified challenges, this paper uses a case narrative to illustrate …

Application Of Expanded Technology Acceptance Model For Enhancing The Hris Usage In Smes, Serkan Bayraktaroglu, Vasfi Kahya, Erhan Atay, Habibe Ilhan

International Journal of Applied Management and Technology

Rapid developments and change have culminated new applications of information technologies. This trend is reflected in the plethora of innovative studies. Literature indicates that small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) perceive human resources information systems (HRIS) as complicated and time consuming, resulting in resistance from both users and employees. The purpose of this article is to identify necessary acceptance conditions for a successful implementation of the HRIS software within SMEs in Turkey. SMEs compose 99% of all companies in Turkey. Fierce rivalry within sectors gives rise to increased technology use to gain a competitive advantage. This study contributes to an efficient …

An Analysis Of Millennial Attitudes Towards Car Servicing, Colwell S. Shupe, Jill M. Synek, Erin M. Chips, Eric A. Van Meter

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

When our team originally began our project, we initially held the assumption that millennials do not care about car ownership or driving. As our secondary research progressed, we found that millennials do indeed care about automobiles, but limited research existed as to any underlying issues regarding car maintenance and service. We addressed this issue in our primary research and found that millennials experience anxiety as they do not know much about car maintenance. Our recommendations were targeted towards easing both the surface anxiety and addressing the underlying issues as well as helping prepare Goodyear for future trends that may arise.

The Rise And Fall Of Bike-Sharing Platforms: A Lesson In E-Commerce, Singapore Management University

Perspectives@SMU

In the era of digital economy, bike-sharing platforms have grown rapidly. However, not all of them survived the competition. Why?

Reflective Practice Series: Selected Instructional Models Using Synchronous Video Conferencing Software, Martin W. Sivula

MBA Faculty Conference Papers & Journal Articles

With the vast array of resources available to instructors, one would think that instruction and teaching would yield success for all learners. Now, well into the 21^st century has much changed in the classroom? Certainly, movable desks and chairs, advanced audio and visual equipment, and a plethora of all types of technologies which might be able to enhance training and education. Over the last several decades research on individualized instruction, cognitive science, educational psychology, and multimedia instruction (to name a few) have permeated the literature on instruction. With all the research and the vast array of studies on improving …

Information Seeking Behavior Of Research Scholars At Muet Library & Online Information Center, Jamshoro: A Study, Liaquat Ali Rahoo Mr, Muhammad Ali Khan Nagar, Maryam Kalhoro, Qurat-Ul-Ain Abro, Shadab Kalhoro

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

The aim of this paper was to study the behavior of the information seeking by the researcher scholars of the at Mehran University of Engineering & Technology, Jamshoro, Sindh Pakistan. The overall purpose of the research study was to find out the awareness and information requirements by the researcher for the research purposes which were provided by the Higher education commission digital library. The data was collected from 230 researchers with the help of questionnaire through the Google online form. Data was analyzed in SPSS software. Research findings were majority of researchers were use electronics resources, text books and reference …

The Case For Showrooming, Cristina Nistor, Prashanth Nyer

Business Faculty Articles and Research

Showrooming has deeply affected the retail market in the past decade. As consumers became able to easily compare prices on their mobile devices, they started using retail stores to try on and experience products and then they ordered online the lower priced versions they liked best to be delivered directly to their homes. As retailers are trying to adapt to the showrooming challenges and the shift to online purchases, stores are increasingly adopting showrooming as a new selling format. We present examples of successful showrooming and develop a framework for when the new selling format can be expected to be …

Understanding Crude Oil Spot And Futures Prices Dynamics During Major Crises, Miroslava Zavadska

Doctoral

This thesis examines crude oil, the dominant energy resource worldwide, its historical behaviour and the resulting implications for world economies. It analyses the role of spot and futures oil prices and their dynamics during periods of market uncertainty. The focus of attention is the understanding of the lead-lag relationship of crude oil spot and futures prices during major crises periods (the first Gulf War in 1990/91, the Asian financial crisis in 1997/98, the US terrorist attack in 2001 and the global financial crisis in 2008/9), and its implications for investors and policy-makers. The mix of applied econometric models gives strength …

An Investigation Of The Benefits And Barriers Of E‐Business Adoption Activities In Yemeni Smes, Ahmed Abdullah, Brychan Thomas, Lyndon Murphy, Eoin Plant

Articles

Yemeni small‐ and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) are at the early stages of e‐business adoption and their owners and managers need to be supported to gain an understanding of the benefits that their business can achieve from adopting e‐business. Yemeni SMEs are at the early stages of e‐business adoption. The delay in adopting more advanced e‐business solutions are due to factors including the comparatively low level of technology usage within the organization, lack of qualified staff available to develop, implement and support firms’ websites, and limited financial resources. A lack of computer software and hardware resources appears to have a detrimental …

China’S Sharing Mobility Economy, Yifan Zhou

Master's Projects and Capstones

Evolution in the urban landscape is key for sustainable development in the world because people have progressively moved from rural areas to live in urban cities. The mobility and transport industry offer the greatest potential to reduce carbon emissions in cities. The arrival of application-based and intelligent-sharing systems into the shores of China has been disruptive to local and international businesses. These has led to a liberation of an automobile sharing economy at a much deeper and greater level: a rise in the use of electric vehicles (EVs), car-pooling, and the utilization of bike-sharing models. Integrating the pre-existing but under-utilized …

Feasibility Of Warehouse Drone Adoption And Implementation, Edward Companik, Michael J. Gravier, M. Theodore Farris Ii

Marketing Department Faculty Journal Articles

While aerial delivery drones capture headlines, the pace of adoption of drones in warehouses has shown the greatest acceleration. Warehousing constitutes 30% of the cost of logistics in the US. The rise of e-commerce, greater customer service demands of retail stores, and a shortage of skilled labor have intensified competition for efficient warehouse operations. This takes place during an era of shortening technology life cycles. This paper integrates several theoretical perspectives on technology diffusion and adoption to propose a framework to inform supply chain decision-makers on when to invest in new robotics technology.

Acquisitions: Walmart Vs Amazon, Scott Sims

Finance Undergraduate Honors Theses

The retail industry is in the process of undergoing major change. Historically big box brick and mortar strategies have dominated, but this is changing in the age of impatience and instant gratification. As consumers want items more conveniently, online retail has taken hold with no semblance of anticipated decline. At the forefront of this transformation are two industry giants: Walmart and Amazon. Walmart finds itself on the side of brick and mortar with 11,718 physical retail locations worldwide. Amazon is dominating the online retail space with control of a staggering 44% of all US e-commerce sales in 2017. These equally …

Implications Of Social Media Use On Instruction And Student Learning: An Exploratory Study, Mayur Desai, Lucy Ojode

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

Despite being a norm in contemporary organizations including in academia, there is limited understanding how multimedia technology use might impact learning. We have also seen a rise in the use of social media applications such as Facebook, tweeter, Instagram, skype, flickr, and blogging among students, but it is unclear the extent to which the academe embraces these applications. In this study, we examine the potential role of multimedia technology and social media use in the learning process. We explore the potential implications for instruction and on student learning of the marriage between multimedia technology and social media use. Focusing on …

Leveraging Decision Making In Cyber Security Analysis Through Data Cleaning, Chen Zhong, Hong Liu, Awny Alnusair

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

Security Operations Centers (SOCs) have been built in many institutions for intrusion detection and incident response. A SOC employs various cyber defense technologies to continually monitor and control network traffic. Given the voluminous monitoring data, cyber security analysts need to identify suspicious network activities to detect potential attacks. As the network monitoring data are generated at a rapid speed and contain a lot of noise, analysts are so bounded by tedious and repetitive data triage tasks that they can hardly concentrate on in-depth analysis for further decision making. Therefore, it is critical to employ data cleaning methods in cyber situational …

The Digital Global Supply Chain: The Growing Case For Blockchain Technology Expansion Within Global Supply Chain, Jonathan Chichoni, Scott Webb Dr.

Undergraduate Honors Theses

In a competitive global market place, technology adoption and application in supply chain is becoming increasingly important as companies seek to acquire competitive advantages. Since blockchain’s advent to the global stage of modern disruptive technologies, several questions remain unanswered pertaining to the benefits that blockchain adoption poses to global supply chains. I apply a typology analysis to a corpus of company filings, press releases and industry studies to better understand the reasons for which global supply chains industry wide are adopting blockchain technology and the specific benefits which they seek to exploit through the use of blockchain. I characterize the …

Glossary Of Business Evidence, Paul C. Boyd

MBA Faculty Conference Papers & Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Are Hospital Efficiency And Quality Of Care Affordable Without External Revenue?, Frank Pieter M. Naus, Carol-Anne Faint, Rocky J. Dwyer

International Journal of Applied Management and Technology

This qualitative study explored strategies academic research hospital administrators in Ontario, Canada, apply to generate nongovernment revenue to remain sustainable. The participants in the study consisted of senior-level academic research hospital executives with extensive experience in the subject area from major academic research hospitals, ranking the hospitals from highest to lowest in revenue generation. From this study, five themes emerged: working within the fiscal reality, the impact of the political environment, the focus on the mission, nongovernment revenue generation, and opportunities for the Ontario academic research hospitals. Findings from this study may contribute to discussions on implementing change by encouraging …